Eirwen and Seraphiel were on their way down the stairs, their hands empty. Well, technically Seraphiel's hands were always empty. It was always just Eirwen carrying stuff.
For the fourth round already.
But this time, something suddenly changed drastically and at first, it wasn't anything strange.
The eastern tower—and the whole fortress in general—had been shaking ever since they arrived, each tremor following the firing of another ballista or the impact of something dying against the outer wall.
Soldiers rushed past them in both directions, some carrying empty crates back down to the supply room while others dragged violet-marked boxes up toward the platform.
Their armour clanged heavily in the narrow stairwell, metal striking stone, boots scraping against the floor, voices rising and disappearing almost immediately beneath the constant thunder from outside.
Eirwen kept close to the inner side of the stairs, his fingers flexing slightly at his side, still irritated by how many times he had been forced to walk this route already.
Seraphiel moved beside him in silence, pale hair falling over his calm face, the silver threads of his white attire catching faint flashes of violet light whenever one of the weapons above fired.
Then Leviathan's voice echoed in his mind. 'Dodge.'
Eirwen's golden eyes widened immediately.
There was no time to think. The warning entered his mind like a blade, and his body reacted before anything else.
One second, he was stepping down the stairs, listening to the clatter of armour and the dull roar of the battle beyond the wall with irritation, and the next, his senses whipped him into motion.
The stone beneath his feet trembled harder.
Eirwen's hand shot out, his palm striking Seraphiel's chest as he shoved him back up the stairs.
The white-haired boy's pale eyes widened for a second, but Eirwen did not bother explaining.
He followed immediately, taking three fast steps back while twisting his body sideways to avoid a soldier carrying an empty crate. The man opened his mouth, probably to curse at him for blocking the stairwell.
But the wall exploded inward before he could make a sound.
For a heartbeat, the black stone bulged.
Then the entire section burst apart.
The noise was so loud that it swallowed every other sound in the tower, turning shouts, footsteps, weapon fire, and distant screams into nothing beneath the single brutal crack of stone giving way.
Chunks of stone, brick, and frozen metal reinforcement flew inward in a wide cone, ripping through the stairwell with enough force to tear men from their feet.
Two Awakened standing closest to the wall were thrown aside immediately.
One smashed against the opposite side of the staircase, his armour folding inward around his ribs before the back of his skull struck the wall with a wet crack. His helmet split against the stone, blood and fragments of bone spraying across the black surface before he slid down in a limp heap, leaving a dark red smear behind him.
The other vanished behind a cloud of dust and broken stone, his weapon spinning through the air before embedding itself in the wall a few steps above Eirwen's head. A moment later, the weapon dissolved, and when the dust shifted, Eirwen saw the man's body crumpled beneath a slab of black stone, blood slowly pooling around what remained of his body.
More soldiers stumbled down the stairs as the shockwave hit them, some falling, some cursing, some raising their arms too late as smaller shards cut through the gaps in their armour.
Then the cold rushed in through the breach with a loud whistle, wild and sharp and full of snow.
The hot, smoke-filled air of the tower was cut apart instantly, replaced by freezing wind that clawed at Eirwen's face and pushed loose strands of blond hair back from his eyes. But with the cold came something else as well. Power!
His Aspect, [Chained Ice], pulled the coldness right into his body, buffing him just a bit.
Snow spiralled into the stairwell, mixing with dust, ash, and black stone powder until the air became a choking grey-white storm.
Eirwen tasted dust on his tongue and blood in his mouth from one of the soldiers who had been torn open by the impact.
The breach gaped in the wall below them, a jagged tear leading straight into the pale chaos outside, and immediately after the impact, something rolled through it.
It burst through the opening with the rest of the rubble and tumbled down the stairs like a swollen barrel of bluish-black meat and bone.
The creature was thick, round, and horrible, its body covered in plates of frozen hide that looked more like iron than skin, with short limbs that scraped uselessly against the stone as momentum carried it downward.
A circular mouth opened somewhere in the front of its body, lined with grinding teeth and packed with bits of broken stone.
Its body was built for impact, for smashing through walls, gates, shields, and anything stupid enough to stand in front of it. But now that it had broken through, it could not stop itself even if it wanted to. It bounced once against the stairwell, clipped the legs of a soldier who failed to move fast enough, and continued rolling downward into the lower levels with a trail of screams, curses, and crushed stone following it.
Eirwen did not waste another thought on the fat one as it passed with a loud scream that sounded like an ugly laugh.
But there were bigger problems waiting for him. A whole swarm of problems, to be precise.
And that swarm came through the breach in a flood!
Thin blue bodies spilled into the tower, crawling over the edges of the hole, slipping between broken iron, leaping off pieces of rubble, and clinging to the wall with long, nail-like claws.
They looked almost human. Small, hunched, ugly things with stretched skin the colour of frozen corpses, large twitching ears, forward snouts, and mouths full of sharp teeth that looked more like nails than fangs. Torn membranes hung between their arms and ribs. Their eyes were dark and wet, their limbs too long for their bodies.
Someone above started shouting orders, and Eirwen heard them, but dismissed them immediately. They were way too slow, and if he did not act, the swarm would overwhelm him and bury him under blue bodies.
'I'm going to be fine,' he thought, before throwing a quick glance at Seraphiel, whose face was slowly shifting from astonishment to concentration. 'But he won't be. And I need him. Damn it!'
His mind went quiet as he settled on what to do. Every useless piece of information fell away, and everything important surfaced.
Just like Gale had taught him.
The breach was below and to the side. The first wave of creatures had already entered, and there were a shit ton of them while even more were coming. The stairs were narrow, which meant that a long weapon would be useless and only a hindrance. The soldiers above needed time to arrive, while those below were disorganized because of the rolling creature.
Eirwen's bright golden eyes widened further as black ink crawled over his hands and he summoned the inky claws over his gauntlets. They emerged like liquid darkness, hardening into curved, blade-like talons that fit over the iron-silver surface of the Steel Shroud.
He lowered his stance like an animal, one foot higher on the stair than the other and ready to push himself off it, golden eyes bright and fixed on the nearest creature pushing through the snow-filled breach.
The first Nightmare Creature leapt at his face with a loud and annoying screech.
And Eirwen moved into it.
His left hand shot upward in an uppercut and caught the creature under the jaw before its teeth could reach his nose and eyes.
The claws punched through flesh, scraped against bone, then tore out through the side of its skull in a spray of black blood and pale brain matter. Its body thrashed once, claws screeching against his shoulder plate, before he twisted his wrist and threw it down the stairs with a groan.
The Spell whispered immediately, clear and cold beneath the noise of the tower.
[You have slain an Awakened Monster: Frostbitten Skreel.]
[You have consumed a Soul!]
[Devour the Flesh for more!]
The next three came together.
Seraphiel raised one hand before they reached him, and the air in front of his palm seemed to tighten.
One Skreel stopped mid-leap as if it had struck an invisible wall, its limbs jerking forward while its spine stayed in place before bulging out disgustingly. With a flick of his wrist, the white-haired boy smashed the Nightmare Creature into the other two.
One hit another Skreel, one hit the wall, and one landed right next to Eirwen's foot.
Eirwen stepped forward and brought his heel down on the creature's neck. The edge of the Steel Shroud cut into flesh, but the Skreel did not die immediately. It twisted and bit into his calf, tearing a strip of meat free before he drove his claws down through the back of its head.
Pain flared up his leg, but the wound started closing almost at once. Eirwen clicked his tongue in annoyance before stomping onto the Nightmare Creature a couple more times until the Spell whispered into his ear.
[You have slain an Awakened Monster: Frostbitten Skreel.]
[You have consumed a Soul!]
[Devour the Flesh for more!]
The other two Skreels, dazed but not dead, were crushed a moment later when Seraphiel closed his fingers. Their ribs caved inward, limbs snapped, skulls flattened against each other, and black blood burst across the wall in a wide smear.
Seraphiel's face remained calm despite the massacre and the situation they were in.
More Skreels poured in, and the stairwell became an absolute, chaotic mess.
An Awakened rushed down from above with a violet spear, only for two Skreels to drop from the ceiling onto his shoulders.
One bit into the side of his helmet and started tearing at the straps while the other clawed at his throat.
He slammed himself against the wall, crushing one of them, but the second dug deep enough to draw blood before another soldier pulled it off and stabbed it through the stomach.
They worked well together, but there were too many creatures and too little space for the soldiers to form properly. The Skreels were not strong compared to the larger horrors outside. They were only Awakened Monsters, and their skin lacked any kind of real defense. Even a single strong punch could realistically cave their skulls in. But inside a narrow tower, numbers and movement mattered more than raw power.
Eirwen groaned and stepped in front of Seraphiel without thinking too much about it.
Not because he cared about the boy, obviously. Seraphiel was simply more useful alive and not buried under a dozen biting creatures. His Aspect was all about crowd control, and that was exactly what they needed right now.
So Eirwen became the part of the formation that could afford to be touched, while Seraphiel supported him from the back.
A Skreel landed on his shoulder and bit into the side of his neck. Another hooked its claws into his left arm, and a third slammed into his chest, driving him back half a step.